Questdog
Prince
I just concluded an experiment where I played 500 turns at Marathon speed with a Progress start and then restarted the same game and went Tradition. This is with the 9-15 build (though the Tradition game was with the hotfix). Both games were wide empires (because I cannot go tall, no matter how hard I try; there is always juicy looking land outside my borders). After 500 turns, my tech and policy count were identical (middle of the Medieval Era). The main differences in the two were that my production was a lot higher in my Tradition game and I got the 3rd religion with Tradition, but did not come close to one with Progress. My happiness is a bit higher in my Progress game, though the Tradition game is not hurting (yet). The Progress game has more cities than the Tradition game (22 to 16). All of my cities in Tradition are a bit higher than their counterparts in base production, but my capital in Tradition is more than double the production of the Progress counterpart. After 500 turns, there are still bonus tiles my Progress capital has failed to annex in its 2nd ring and only one 3rd ring tile that does not belong to the 2nd ring of another city has been claimed. My Tradition capital has all of its workable tiles claimed and is currently annexing 4th ring tiles.
I do not see where Progress gave me any edge over Tradition, except in Happiness. Of course, that could change going forward, but the Tradition game has just been more fun and I will not be playing the Progress game further.
In both games my continent was populated by China, Carthage and America. I was England (as always). In the Progress game, all three of the other empires took Authority. In my Tradition game, only America took Authority, while Carthage took Progress and China took Tradition. China taking Tradition snagged a lot of early wonders (beating me to the Great Library by 1 turn, even though I had invested in it). In both games, China was very close (12 tiles on Large map) and declared an early war and was wiped out by me, though when we both had Tradition, it was tougher because she got walls in a few cities, including her capital before I had any catapults. Carthage with Authority was a power and declared war on my Progress empire in the Classical Era, though I easily beat her back. With Progress she was inept. She had a massive navy with Authority, but no ships that I could see with Progress. America was Friendly to me in both games, being the furthest of the three from me, but when I had Progress, we had a DoF at turn 500. In the Tradition game, he and I were the only religions on the continent and this strained relations a bit.
Anyway, the takeaway for me was the the only thing Progress gave me over Tradition was the Happiness to go wider, but this was more than offset by the overall production, religion and mega-capital of Tradition. One other plus of Progress, especially on Marathon speed where it takes 23 turns to build a farm, is the boost to worker construction rate, but this is kind of negated by the fact that Progress has a hard time finding tiles to improve. After 500 turns, I have one 11 pop city that reports it expects to annex a new tile in 346 turns..... Of course you could buy tiles, but especially in the medieval era, gold is at a premium with all the unit upgrades and building investments.
I do not see where Progress gave me any edge over Tradition, except in Happiness. Of course, that could change going forward, but the Tradition game has just been more fun and I will not be playing the Progress game further.
In both games my continent was populated by China, Carthage and America. I was England (as always). In the Progress game, all three of the other empires took Authority. In my Tradition game, only America took Authority, while Carthage took Progress and China took Tradition. China taking Tradition snagged a lot of early wonders (beating me to the Great Library by 1 turn, even though I had invested in it). In both games, China was very close (12 tiles on Large map) and declared an early war and was wiped out by me, though when we both had Tradition, it was tougher because she got walls in a few cities, including her capital before I had any catapults. Carthage with Authority was a power and declared war on my Progress empire in the Classical Era, though I easily beat her back. With Progress she was inept. She had a massive navy with Authority, but no ships that I could see with Progress. America was Friendly to me in both games, being the furthest of the three from me, but when I had Progress, we had a DoF at turn 500. In the Tradition game, he and I were the only religions on the continent and this strained relations a bit.
Anyway, the takeaway for me was the the only thing Progress gave me over Tradition was the Happiness to go wider, but this was more than offset by the overall production, religion and mega-capital of Tradition. One other plus of Progress, especially on Marathon speed where it takes 23 turns to build a farm, is the boost to worker construction rate, but this is kind of negated by the fact that Progress has a hard time finding tiles to improve. After 500 turns, I have one 11 pop city that reports it expects to annex a new tile in 346 turns..... Of course you could buy tiles, but especially in the medieval era, gold is at a premium with all the unit upgrades and building investments.